The US Election.

Musk is now interfering in UK politics, regardless of how anyone feels about the agricultural land IHT decision, I strongly object to Musk's opinions being on the front page of the Telegraph.

Scary but possible Babs
😕

Is naive to expect that Trump will only be bad news for Americans, the reach of the US stretches right around the globe. Am imagining that Trump’s admiration for dictators/strong men who terrorise their neighbours will extend to Bibi as well as Putin, indeed the whole reason why Bibi is dragging his feet with regard to a ceasefire is because he sees Trump as a wholehearted ally who will rejoice in the eradication of all Palestinians, and probably want to move the American embassy to Northern Gaza, once it has been redeveloped, perhaps with some of his hotels or a golf course near the med.
Might sound crazy but hey we are dealing with Uber crazy with Trump and let’s not forget that Musk is now his guru.
😳

I expect most of these clinics are not-for-profit and offer all sorts of women's services - education and maternal health/prenatal care, emergency contraception etc Nmama so they would be a terrible loss to their communities.

I had the very best prenatal care of all my 5 babies/pregnancies at just such a clinic Emma Goldman Clinic. It is still going but 40 plus years ago was totally amazing. It offered walk-in services (sti and bp testing, signposting to other support etc) as well as counselling and help through adoption- I'm sure it's not alone in not only offering abortion.

Women's health is such a massive area and these clinics are usually set up by women for women - I'm so sorry that you had to drive to LA to support your friend.

Thanks Dickens, the way the media reported that made me despair. No wonder we are so divided.

So many decent Americans must they're staring into the abyss. Dark days ahead

I see what you mean. But I suspect that to some of his followers--especially those who saw her principled participation in the Jan. 6 hearings--"Let's put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK?" might sound an awful lot like a suggestion or a challenge.

Maybe it's a forlorn hope, but all the same I'm hoping that a large enough number of US women will have enough concern about their own health, their daughters' health, and their granddaughters,' to vote against Trump and JD Vance. I've known two people who got abortions in the US, a long time ago. One was 13 and lived in Texas; her family had to bring her to California in order for it to happen. That would be illegal now, I believe, and they might all go to jail. The other was a 16 year old friend of mine who had been taking god only knows what drugs and who was involved with a man who was just as mentally wrecked as she was, but a lot more heartless. I was 16 too and I borrowed my dad's car and drove her to the Free Clinic in LA and sat there in a daze during the procedure. I was practically in shock myself, and she was in a real mental health crisis and obviously in much, much worse shape. Two 16 year olds organizing her future, more or less in shock, driving around LA--what a world, but it wasn't as if our parents would have been capable of anything like sympathy or concern. I too have been pregnant and wouldn't have lost my baby for anything, but I've never felt the least regret for driving my friend to and from the Clinic that day.

Macadia

Trump just told citizens to gun down Liz Cheney? What is going on?

Much as I loathe the man - facts and context are important.

Trump accused her of being a "war hawk":

"I don't want to go to war. (Liz Cheney) wanted to go, she wanted to stay in Syria. I took (troops) out. She wanted to stay in Iraq. I took them out. I mean, if were up to her, we'd, we'd be in 50 different countries. And you know, number one, it's very dangerous. Number two, a lot of people get killed. And number three, I mean, it's very, very expensive."

Later, Trump added

"I don’t blame (Dick Cheney) for sticking with his daughter, but his daughter is a very dumb individual, very dumb. She is a radical war hawk. Let's put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK? Let's see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face."

Words matter, truth matters. Trump twists the truth, he talks about fake-news, he makes things up, lies, and I think he's a very dangerous man who is a threat to democracy. But deliberately twisting what he said is wrong, and also dangerous.

Decide for yourself.

Trump just told citizens to gun down Liz Cheney? What is going on?

I can't tell who is winning. I see that polls predict that Harris is ahead of Trump by a slivver but then the swing states polls show that Trump has won three quarters of their votes. 4 days !!!!

If every time men had sex, they risked death, physical disability, a life altering interruption in their education or career, and the sudden lifelong responsibility for another human being, I think they’d expect a choice in the matter - @cher

Babs03

Btw have no opinion on Harris above and beyond the fact that she isn’t Trump. That is more than good enough for me.

Well said !

Nmama

Thanks for your kind thoughts; they're very much appreciated.

I have been interested in how the US election is covered in British papers because I was living in Britain as a student when it began to be evident that Nixon and his cronies were corrupt. I was astonished at the very critical coverage (and very excited; that was not the coverage US papers were providing, in general). With Trump in the White House I again began to look at coverage in papers not owned by Murdoch. And now here I am, noting that Trump yesterday said that he would protect women, whether we like it or not, but today said that Liz Chaney--a never Trumper Republican--should face a firing squad. Protect her to death, I guess. I'm trying not to panic.

As a side note, long after Nixon was dead it came out that one of the major players in bringing him down--called "Deep Throat" by the men at the Washington Post who were getting information from him--had once been my father's boss. A few years ago I got my son to watch "All the President's Men", about how the Post cracked the story, and every time the character who played "Deep Throat" was on screen I began saying "That was Grandpa's boss, honey!" My poor son: eventually he said "I KNOW! I get it, Mom! He was Grandpa's boss!" After the movie he said, in tones of surprise, "That was a really good movie!" Yeah, I said, the Oscar for Best Picture and all that . . . he (like many people his age; he's 32) found it hard to imagine that movies made during and before my childhood, or black and white movies, could be any good. Then he saw "Arsenic and Old Lace" and loved it.

I can’t believe that some people are still considering voting for him after what he said about Liz Chaney .

Also, I've noticed "the cabal" info ramping up again - including the old video of the envelopes at George Bush’s funeral!

Wyllow3

Reports on how Trump supporters are planning to intervene in the elections and after are very troubling. (been doing a round up of US news).
Detailed article is the best one, bit of a read

edition.cnn.com/2024/10/31/politics/maga-activists-preparing-undermine-election-if-trump-loses/index.html

Wyllow3, they are already putting out videos on social media of "faulty" voting machines (defaulting to a Harris vote).

Getting the lies in first.

Nmama, ah a young Redford and Hoffman, loved that film, and if your son loves 'arsenic and old lace' he would probs like 'An inspector calls' the Alistair Sim version.
But on a more serious note keep us informed from your neck of the woods.
Take care.

Thanks for your kind thoughts; they're very much appreciated.

I have been interested in how the US election is covered in British papers because I was living in Britain as a student when it began to be evident that Nixon and his cronies were corrupt. I was astonished at the very critical coverage (and very excited; that was not the coverage US papers were providing, in general). With Trump in the White House I again began to look at coverage in papers not owned by Murdoch. And now here I am, noting that Trump yesterday said that he would protect women, whether we like it or not, but today said that Liz Chaney--a never Trumper Republican--should face a firing squad. Protect her to death, I guess. I'm trying not to panic.

As a side note, long after Nixon was dead it came out that one of the major players in bringing him down--called "Deep Throat" by the men at the Washington Post who were getting information from him--had once been my father's boss. A few years ago I got my son to watch "All the President's Men", about how the Post cracked the story, and every time the character who played "Deep Throat" was on screen I began saying "That was Grandpa's boss, honey!" My poor son: eventually he said "I KNOW! I get it, Mom! He was Grandpa's boss!" After the movie he said, in tones of surprise, "That was a really good movie!" Yeah, I said, the Oscar for Best Picture and all that . . . he (like many people his age; he's 32) found it hard to imagine that movies made during and before my childhood, or black and white movies, could be any good. Then he saw "Arsenic and Old Lace" and loved it.

Babs03

Freya5

Your last sentence , absolutely agree. I am finding it fascinating though. I think the House of Representatives will choose the President if no outright electoral college result, unusual I know, but things are running very close.

Well if this happened Trump would say he had won and his armed supporters would descend upon the House of Representatives.
I don’t know what I fear most - Trump winning or Trump not winning 😣

I don’t know what I fear most - Trump winning or Trump not winning 😣

Couldn't have said it better.

It's a 'heads-I-win-or-tails-you-lose' situation.

Freya5

Your last sentence , absolutely agree. I am finding it fascinating though. I think the House of Representatives will choose the President if no outright electoral college result, unusual I know, but things are running very close.

Well if this happened Trump would say he had won and his armed supporters would descend upon the House of Representatives.
I don’t know what I fear most - Trump winning or Trump not winning 😣

Your last sentence , absolutely agree. I am finding it fascinating though. I think the House of Representatives will choose the President if no outright electoral college result, unusual I know, but things are running very close.

I find all the celebrity endorsements o both sides utterly awful and hilarious at the same time. Ricky Gervais has just done a brilliant spoof of it all.

It is truly shocking that the US is in this mess and frightening for it's citizens as well as for the rest of the democratic world. I remember seeing a photo of Americans queuing up at a gun store at the start of the pandemic whilst we queued up for loo paper, it said a lot!

Wyllow3

Reports on how Trump supporters are planning to intervene in the elections and after are very troubling. (been doing a round up of US news).
Detailed article is the best one, bit of a read

edition.cnn.com/2024/10/31/politics/maga-activists-preparing-undermine-election-if-trump-loses/index.html

Trump’s allies – and the former president himself – are increasingly pushing debunked claims of voter fraud, spreading their rhetoric through podcasts with massive audiences, megachurch sermons and political rallies in key states. Some Trump backers, including pastors associated with Christian nationalist ideas, have described the election as a fight between good and evil, describing Harris as the antichrist or suggesting that God has anointed Trump as the victor.

I couldn't read further Wyllow3...

This is the kind of thing you used to read about happening in so-called third-world countries where elections were allegedly rigged and the electorate intimidated by politician's henchmen - where ill-educated neighbours would fight each other on the outskirts of the city or towns.

It's almost reaching 'Talibanesque' proportions - a different faith, but similar 'reasoning' - yes, I'm over-dramatising, but there is a commonality. When the religious Right see their President as a 'saviour' of the country and his opponents as the enemy, and said would-be-President has 'anointed' various individuals to be in the legislature of the federal government; the Republicans are projected to take control of the House and set the legislative agenda (one model predicts a 53% chance - 'The Hill' updates its projections daily).

What will this mean for women's rights? Trump has promised to protect women, that is not the same as protecting women's rights. Exactly what the Taliban (and its various offshoots) promised.

I'm sure Trump doesn't intend to prevent women from working! But women with the care and responsibility of children do not have the same advantage in the workplace - any workplace, boardroom or kitchen, as men with children whose wives look after both. Banning abortion, even if only state-wise, will certainly prevent women from, ultimately, wielding too much power in commerce, in politics, etc.

That appears to fit with the Republican-Christian-Conservative-Right ideology of the all-American family. Have you seen those Christmas cards - they appear regularly - of Maw and Paw cradling rifles on their knees with assorted children similarly seated with their own smaller weapons?

Praise the Lord, and pass the ammunition.

Reports on how Trump supporters are planning to intervene in the elections and after are very troubling. (been doing a round up of US news).
Detailed article is the best one, bit of a read

edition.cnn.com/2024/10/31/politics/maga-activists-preparing-undermine-election-if-trump-loses/index.html

Jane43

I really hope Harris wins for the sake of the women of the USA and the thought of what might happen if Trump loses is worrying.

I really hope Harris wins for the sake of the women of the USA...

Oh don't worry, Trump is going to protect them (whether they like it or not). Although I don't know what it is that he is going to protect them from.

He seems to have back-pedalled a bit on abortion - I think he wants to leave it to individual states rather than make it a federal ban - maybe that's what he means?

However, Musk and Vance appear to believe that women who do not have children are somewhat lacking - so much so that Musk has even offered to 'give' a very popular female singer "a child" to rectify this problem.

So, who knows what form this 'protection' is going to take.

I hope Harris wins too, for the sake of women, I really do.

But if she does, Trump is not going to retire gracefully. He will not accept it - his ego will not allow it could happen. He does not see Harris as the Opposition, but as the enemy - his personal enemy and the enemy of the USA.

And he has some supporters - God alone knows how many - who see it that way too. The Proud Boys and Oath-Keepers (or whatever they are called) are red-blooded Republicans - and they are armed.

Whoever wins, it's not going to end well.

Btw have no opinion on Harris above and beyond the fact that she isn’t Trump. That is more than good enough for me.